


Poison

by CorvidFeathers



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Drunken Confessions, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 17:16:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5674192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorvidFeathers/pseuds/CorvidFeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was something else bothering André, something perhaps worse than the sting of his shattered ambitions.  It lingered still, poison that Philomena had no idea how to draw out, or even if it was reasonable to try.</p>
<p>OR</p>
<p>Someone gives John André a much-needed hug after 2x10 but of course it's a bit more complicated than that</p>
            </blockquote>





	Poison

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic for a couple reasons: André's last scene in Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot killed me a little, and I really liked Philomena, the actress he recruits to spy on Charles Lee in the first season. I thought their relationship was interesting, and I wanted to explore it further and expand on it a bit!  
> Also, this fic is gen in that the two are not involved romantically, but there are some complicated feelings and an (almost) sex scene.   
> I would love any feedback you have to give, this is my first time writing these characters!

Life as one of John André’s ‘flowers’ suited Philomena.

Life in the theater had been full of beautiful fabrications; the costumer had been an illusionist crafting the mirage of luxury with cheap, reused fabric and glass jewels.  The actors and actresses were just tradespeople playing at being aristocrats and kings.  On a good night onstage, the illusions took life, and buoyed Philomena through each show, through each life with a rush of glory.  On most nights, she had been well aware of the chips in her jewelry and the jeers of the audience.

Now, real luxury was something within her grasp.  For André’s parties, she wore dresses worth more than she had ever made treading the boards, and rubbed elbows with the elite of the British forces.  

Of course, like all jobs, it had its ups and downs.  Being intimate with the most unctuous of André’s peers for table scraps of gossip was easily her least favorite part.  ‘Whore’ was a comfortable role to slip into; God knew she had played it often enough before, on and off stage.  But that hadn’t deadened her taste.  It was easy enough to charm the handsome young officers and lead them to bed, but the bilious old men were less pleasant.  She took it all with a charming smile, mindful of the role she had been cast in.

Some of the other whores were more cutthroat than the actresses she had known, but for the most part they were decent women.  They stuck together, and Philomena always was ready to offer a word of encouragement. The witticism about flies and honey had always been a part of her personality, and she never made enemies when she could avoid it.  Nevertheless, she also maintained a degree of aloofness; ‘whore’ was, ultimately, just a role.  One of the many she had as one of André’s agents.

More fun where the infrequent times when André would give her other roles.  Usually she would receive instructions hidden amongst the word of amorous letters.  One sunny afternoon in André’s study, he had begun to teach her the basics of encoding and decoding messages.  At the beginning it had been hard to wrap her mind around, but she was a quick study.  

This was why he had chosen her, he had murmured, watching with a cat-like smile as she decoded another of his test letters successfully.  An actress like her would be literate, but lack the ingrained constraints that governed a woman of higher status.  Philomena was _flexible_.

So with little love notes, André sent her on trips across the colonies.  Some instructions were mundane; collect a letter or a scrap of paper from one location and bring it to another.  Some were much, much more exciting.  One of the most exciting had involved the seduction of one of the scores of French noblemen who had flocked to the American cause to win glory.  The mission had yielded less information than André had hoped for, but Philomena had to admit there was a certain thrill to the fact that she had fucked a French aristocrat and then played him like a fiddle.

Occasionally, André gave her instructions personally.  She would come to his house in the guise of one of his flowers, an occurrence normal enough that no one on the street would question it, and would be shown in to his drawing room.

It had been months since she had met with André face to face; since the army had taken Philadelphia, she had received her instructions only through his little notes, and the jobs he set her never brought her anywhere near to the city.  She was kept busy, keeping an eye on several of the army officials who had gotten a taste for her at André’s parties, and occasionally running the more exciting jobs across enemy lines.

But a letter had come that morning.  The note was far simpler than the usual code they used; it was mere line, asking her to grace André’s home with her presence at twelve o’clock and reminding her that he had taken up his previous residence after his return to New York.

Philomena left the note on her bedside table, and glanced at it now and then as she dressed. The cramped confines of her garrett gave her little room to maneuvre as she went about her morning routine, but the large mirror in the corner made up for it.  It only took her a few moments to decide on her dress; a green number that looked good with her tumble of golden-brown curls.  She added a thin necklace that had been a gift from André after a job well done.

As she primped and preaned, she contemplated the unencoded message.  Handwriting was another topic of their little meetings, after code; he had taught her the rudimentaries of recognizing handwriting, and she had learned a little of forgery before he left to Philadelphia.

The handwriting was certainly André’s, but it seemed shakier than usual.  Hasty, perhaps.  Not quite his.

Philomena mused over this, turning it over in her mind as she lit a candle.  She held the note out the candle flame, and watched it devour the shaky letters.

The journey from her quarters to André’s was long enough, and mindless enough by then, that she spent much of the time lost in thought.  There was a possibility that the note was forged, that some enemy was luring her out for… for what purpose?  It was an easy enough conclusion that she was one of André’s whores, and it wasn’t wrong.  Her association with him in York City was blatant; she was able to work as his agent in other affairs because she was inconsequential and interchangeable with the hundreds of women just like her.  

So what would a hypothetical enemy have to gain, by luring her to André’s house?  Nothing.  If someone wished to kill her, it would have been easier to do in her garret.

André’s house was a familiar sight and a welcome one.  She hesitated at the side for a moment, unsure which entrance to knock at.  

Boldness won out of caution.  Philomena strode up to the front door and knocked.

She was shown into the house by a sharp-eyed slave woman whom she recognized from André’s household before it moved to Philadelphia.  Abigail, Philomena thought.  After a few minutes in the lobby, which held a number of memories both pleasant and unpleasant for Philomena, Abigail reappeared and led her back to André’s study.

He was sitting at his desk, his back to her, writing a missive when she walked in the room.  Abigail retreated without saying anything, leaving her standing in the doorway alone.

After a moment, when André didn’t turn around, she stepped into the familiar room.  It was as she remembered it, but like the writing on the note, everything was slightly off.  Items askew from the regular, precise placement; piles of paper slipping from their usual, orderly stacks and scattering on the floor.  

After she had taken two steps, André turned to look at her.

He looked a different man than the one who she had last seen in New York: the confident general, the impeccable host, the spymaster whose charming smile and smooth manner hid a ruthless intellect.  All of those personas had been stripped away to reveal something else.  Something raw and dangerous and… despairing.  Hurt.

In all her memories of the man, aside from the most intimate and those muddled and patchy recollections of his parties, André had always presented an immaculate image; always in his pristine uniform or equally pristine civilian clothing, with neatly-arrayed hair tied back or a well-styled wig.

Now he looked… tired.  His uniform was wrinkled, and his hair hung at his shoulders, unchecked.  The smudges under his eyes spoke of poor sleep and strain.

News of the defeat at Monmouth Courthouse had already spread through the whole of the New York colony.  The war had not been a particular concern of Philomena’s until she had wound up entangled in the affairs of one of its most clever players.  Now she watched headlines, half hungry and half afraid, and collected every scrap of gossip she heard of the tide of the war.  André had made it clear to her, after she had been in his service for a few months, that when it came to the war she no longer had the protection of being a civilian, or even a woman.  If she were ever to be discovered as a spy, she would be hung or worse.

André had been involved with Monmouth, she knew.  The defeat would be a blow to his reputation, but not one he could not recover from.  André had always seemed the sort of person who would always recoup his losses.

“Major,” she said.

He blinked at her wearily, and it took a moment too long for recognition to flicker through his eyes.  “Ah, Philomena.”  He stood up to greet her, the movement a little too quick.  “You look lovely as always.”  He took her hand and pressed a kiss to the back of it, his manner impeccable as always.

But as with everything else, something was off.  His voice was slightly slurred, and with a start she realized he was drunk.  She should have picked up on it more quickly; she’d seen him thoroughly debauched countless times.  But this was different.  This put her on edge.

She smiled and simpered at the compliment.  “I’ve missed you terribly, Major.  A woman can receive only so many letters of business hidden in love poems before she starts to crave true tokens of affection.”

“Unfortunately, my return is only due to the failures of the army,” André snarled.  

Philomena started and took a step back, driven away by the sheer rancor dripped from his words.  She stared at André, and André stared at her. For a moment, the tense silence threatened to suffocate the room.

After another beat, André turned away, dropping back into his chair.  “Would I were in Philadelphia…” she heard him murmur.  Something like despair had wormed its way into his voice.

She swallowed.  “Maybe I should come back tomor-”

“Sit,” André barked.  “Now.”  He gestured at the stool at the other side of his desk.

She sat, and tried to fix her most winning smile on her face, feeling as if she had stepped onto stage only to find her scene partner had changed all of the lines.

Another moment of tense silence crawled by.

“I’m sending you behind enemy lines,” André said.  “To Washington.”

She stared at him.  “M-Major?  To Washington?  What do you-”

“What I said,” he snapped.  “It is clear that the man is a tyrant; it is useless trying to influence the Continental Army through others.  I had hoped to turn an ally of his, but that has all fallen to dust.  I have nowhere else to strike but against the man himself.  I have nothing to lose.”

Philomena could not keep the horror from her face.  Whatever fervor of despair the Major was in the grips of was costing his sense.  He very well might be inclined towards suicidal risks, but she was not.

“Washington’s personal life seems impregnable,” André said, brushing back a lock of hair from his face.  She realized that the long blonde braid he usually wore was gone- shorn away.  What was left of it was unbraided and left to hang with the rest of his hair.  “But he surrounds himself with hungry young men.  His military family.  By all reports, he trusts them above all else.  They write his correspondence; they advise him.  Young men like this brash and arrogant, prone to bragging and loose talk.  Easily swayed by women.  Especially a woman of your talents.”

Her fear made her bold.  “Major- that… it would be difficult for me to meet one of these men naturally, would it not?”  Playing the simple strumpet to seduce General Lee or one of the men she put herself in the path of was easy enough, and playing the cultured whore with André’s fellow officers was even easier, but that all relied on there being a plausible place and time for her to capture her target’s attentions.  

He shook his head.  “I will craft you a letter of introduction, introducing you as a distant relative of-”

“Lee,” she blurted.  “General Lee is back with the Continental Army.  If he saw me, he would recognize me in a moment, I know-”

André was not accustomed to being interrupted.  His eyes flashed with barely-contained anger.  “Philomena-”

That anger scared her.  She had never talked to him like this, she had never seen him so angry, so close to losing control, but she was not going to let him throw her life away.  She had seen one too many hangings to ever resign herself to that fate.  “No.  That plan won’t work, Major.”  She spread her palms out in front of her, and talked over his retort.  “So you try to pass me off as some daughter from a good family.  You’ll get me hung.  I don’t know the slightest thing about being some planter’s daughter.  I’m an actress; I can play a strumpet, I can play a courtesan, but _debutante_ is not a role I would be convincing in. You would be better off recruiting one of your own social sphere if you want to seduce Washington’s boys.”

She had struck a nerve.  For a moment she thought he might strike her, but she did not draw back, or drop her gaze from his.

After a moment, he laughed, and all the anger abruptly left his expression.  He leaned back in his chair, toying with the unbraided lock of blonde in his dark hair.  “You’re right, of course.  That was the conclusion I came to, long before.  I had toyed with the idea of sending you, or one of the other women in my employ… but a false heiress will always be inferior to the genuine article.”  His lips curled in a sneer.  “Circumstances have changed, but I still cannot use a strumpet for a virgin’s job.”

The words might have stung, but all Philomena felt was relief.

In the wake of anger, a deep weariness settled over André.  He sighed, pressing his fingers to his temples.  The lines at the corners of his eyes and mouth stood out starkly, all at once seeming like evidence of wear, instead of laughter lines.

“Major…?” she asked.

André was not a man that Philomena had ever fancied having anything more than a dalliance with.  He had caught her eye on that miserable stage, looking at her with equal parts hunger and admiration, and she wasn’t sure which one had made him want her more.  His affection was the same, equal parts dominance and worship, giving generously as he expected something completely different from her.  He had plainly enjoyed the audacity of their affair, enjoyed that she was his even as she pretended love for his captive rebel general.

What a strange winter that had been, for Philomena.  But in the months following Lee’s orchestrated ‘escape,’ any amorous affair between her and André had ended.  He had moved on to other things, and she had merely become his agent.  Not that she would have flattered herself to believe she had ever been more than a passing affair to begin with.  But the same heat had lingered in their interactions until now.

She had always thought herself pragmatic.  She was friendly to most, enjoyed her time with the people fortune brought her, and did not fall into the trap of loving deeply those who were so far above of her.

It was only practical.

“I cannot abandon my sources so rashly,” he murmured, more to himself than her.  “Disregarding any stake in the matter…”  He sounded so miserable.

He reached for the decanter on his desk, to refill the glass sitting empty at his shoulder.  His hands were trembling, and he tipped the decanter clumsily.

Philomena watched wine drip onto the papers of his desk for a moment, before she stood up and came around to his of the desk to take the decanter and finish pouring the wine.  “I’m not so bold to say I know much about the matters of the war,” she said.  “Not even to say I know you well.  But I do know you’re not thinking clearly.”  She picked up the goblet and held it out to him.

His eyes flickered to her face as he took it with unsteady hands.  “Perhaps you are right.”  He took a long drink of wine, and then set the goblet down with a small sigh.  “All has not turned out as I hoped it would, of late.”

“You mean Monmouth,” she said carefully.

“Among other things.  It seems Providence has not favored my hand of late,” he said, with a bitter laugh.  “Ah, what is the use of blaming Providence?  It is my own poor judgement that has brought all this about.  My own _ambition_.”  The last word was a snarl.

He reached for the decanter again, but she stopped his hand with her own, curling his fingers around his.  “Your head is clouded enough,” she said.

Irritation flashed over his expression, but it was quickly smoothed away by amusement.  “Rest assured, I will not facilitate further poor decisions,” he said, clasping her hand for a moment, then slipping his hand from hers to pick up the decanter.  He managed to pour the wine without spilling it this time.  “Drink with me.”  He offered her the goblet.

She took it, and took a long drink, and then held it out to him again.  

After a few minutes of silence, he began to tell her of Monmouth Courthouse.  How he had planned to win the day; the instructions he had sent to General Lee, the high hopes he had that the war might be won.  Until George Washington appeared where he should not have been, rallied his troops, and carried the day.

His words grew more slurred and jumbled together as he spoke and they drained the decanter a cup at a time.  

Philomena had had little to eat all day, as she had been roused by the courier with André’s note.  The wine hit her empty stomach hard, and it wasn’t long before she was tipsy.  She tried to rein herself in then, straddling the line between tipsy and truly drunk as André descended further into his melancholic monologue.

At some point, André’s monologue was broken by a knock on the study door.  When André showed no inclination to respond, Philomena jumped down from the spot she had taken sitting on his desk, and went to answer it.

Abigail was standing outside the door, a platter of light food balanced in her hands.  

“I thought you might be hungry, given that your business here has gone on so long,” Abigail murmured.  

A glance out the window told Philomena that dusk was fast approaching.  Somehow he day had slipped away as she sat in André’s study.  She realized she was ravenous; the wine hadn’t done much to satisfy her appetite.  In any case, she could use some ballast if André was going to keep on like this.

A faint smile graced André’s features as Abigail set the platter down and beat a quick retreat.  “Few days go by that I fail to be thankful Major Hewlett sent you to my service,” he called to Abigail.

She paused at the door, and turned and curtsied.

Her eye caught Philomena’s, and a sort of understanding passed between them.  They both understood the burden of being women subject to the whims of those who could violently alter their worlds on the slightest whim.  Of course, Philomena had come into André’s service willingsly, and was free to leave if she pleased, while Abigail had no say in the matter at all.

Philomena couldn’t imagine a life like that.

The moment passed, and Abigail was gone, closing the door softly behind her.

Philomena wasted no time getting to the food.  She plucked a grape from the platter, and bit into it delicately.  She ate silently; André seemed content to nurse the goblet of wine and stare at the papers scattered on the floor.

There was something else bothering him, something perhaps worse than the sting of his shattered ambitions.  It lingered still, poison that Philomena had no idea how to draw out, or even if it was reasonable to try.

“How did you find Philadelphia?” she hazarded.  “More accommodating than York City?”

He grimaced.  “Less so, in the end.”  An ugly expression twisted his features.  “It is filled with the worst sorts of loyalist families, snobbish and squabbling over scraps…”  He leaned forward, and rested his head in his hands.  

“Major?” she said, slipping down from her perch once more to put her hands on his shoulders.

“I have the most damnable headache,” he said, voice muffled and slurred.

“Perhaps you ought to get some rest,” she said.

To her surprise, instead of arguing, he began to stand.  “Perhaps you are right.”  He swayed, and had to brace himself on his desk to keep from falling.

Philomena slipped his arm over her shoulder.  “Come on.  I’ll help you upstairs.”

She had had plans to see him to his room and then quietly slip away, back to her garrett.  The day had already been strange enough for her.

But somehow in the process of navigating their way up the stairs, André leaned on her had become a drunk tangle of limbs, that devolved further once they reached his bedroom.  His lips were on hers, her hands in his hair, as they tumbled ungracefully into his bed.

It had been a while since she had been in this room, but she had not forgotten how pleasurable their encounters had been.  Her body responded instantly to his touch, and she craved it everywhere, the visceral memory of all that they had done before flickering through her core.  

His kisses were clumsy, his hands on her bodice less deft than usual, but she was too in the moment to care.  All the sense and inhibition that should have logically prompted her to withdraw had departed, and she could think only of him.

Until he murmured.  “Peggy.”

She froze.  Their eyes in the dim light, and an uncomfortable moment of silence settled between them.

They moved at the same moment- André just away from Philomena, as Philomena swung her legs over the edge of the bed to stand up.

“Philomena.”  Her name stopped her in her tracks, as she clumsily readjusted her bodice.  

It was not the first time she had been in bed with a man who called out another woman’s name.  Of course, even if the man meant to address her, more often than not it was not the name she had been given at birth on his lips.  Especially of late.

None of that mattered to her.  She played a role, nothing more.

Except the way André had always said it had mattered.  He could turn her name into something beautiful; a soft exhalation, a murmur of adoration.  A poem, all by itself.  He had a ways with words.

But that was then, and this was now, and it had all been just a bit of hopeless flattery.  Shame followed on the heels of her anger; had it been he who kissed her first on the stairs, or she who kissed him?  The moments were a blur to her suddenly sober mind.  But it had been a mistake, either way, and she should not have entertained notions of what had been before.

“Philomena,” André’s voice was cracking as he repeated it.

She cared for him; that was a foolish truth that she could admit in the dark.  Amidst all her fears, mixed in with her base desires and ambitions, she cared for this inscrutable man.  In what measure, she did not know.  Only that it was something beyond a surface admiration, beyond self-preservation.

So she came back to the bed.  “John,” she said softly, sitting down beside him.  

There were tears glistening on his cheeks, and she reached up to wipe them away with her fingertips.

He leaned into her touch for a moment, and then rested his head on her shoulder.  She drew him into her arms as finally, the last vestiges of his guard broke down and he begun to cry in earnest.

The story came out, little by little, in choked whispers.  The woman he had met in Philadelphia, who had at first been only another piece in his game.  How she had watched her wits with his, and won his heart.  The plans they had made together… and how it had all fallen down around them.

She listened quietly, her own heart aching a little.  There was nothing she could say to remedy any of it.

When his words trailed off, she ran her fingers through his hair until she found all the strands of blonde, and carefully began it.  She tied the braid with a bit of thread from the cuff of her dress.  It was short, and not so neat as she had seen it before, but he looked a little more himself.

“I am truly sorry,” he murmured, catching her hand in his as she fiddled with the braid.

“It’s nothing,” she said.  When he fell silent again, looking at her with worn, sad eyes, she leaned over and kissed him once, chastely.  “Your Peggy is not yet married, is she?  Even if she were to be, she plainly does not love this Arnold.  You merely have to win the war and rescue her.”

He smiled faintly. “You make it sound so easy.”

“If any man could change the tide of the war, it would be you,” she said, drawing him down to lie beside her on the bed, and pulling the covers over them both.  “You know that all too well.”

“I have already tried,” he said.

“So try again,” she murmured.  “But for now… sleep.”

His smile was more genuine this time, but she only caught a glimpse- her own weariness was catching up on her.  She felt him gather her in his arms before she drifted off to sleep.

When Philomena woke, it was to the golden light of the dawn shining in through the gap between the curtains of André’s room.  She was alone in the bed.  

A faint headache pulsed behind her eyes as she rose out of bed, reminding her of the night before. Now, it felt like some sort of strange dream.  But here she was, in André’s bed, fully dressed.  

She got up, and spent several minutes in front of André’s mirror, trying in vain to smooth the wrinkles from her dress and rearrange her hair into something more dignified than a golden frizz.  

After achieving mediocre results, she decided she was collected enough to risk venturing out. It was a bit surprising, waking alone in André’s bed; after the night he had had, it would have made more sense for him to oversleep.

She stretched, cat-like, moaned a little over her headache, and then padded down the stairs of André’s house.  She peered first into the dining room, where she found Abigail laying out silverware for breakfast.

To her credit, Abigail was far too used to André’s tendencies to balk at Philomena’s early presence.  “The Major is in his study, if you’re looking for him,” she said softly.  The look she gave Philomena seemed to say that if she wasn’t looking for him, but rather an escape, she would be willing to assist her. Philomena smiled back gratefully.

“Thank you, Abigail,” she said, and went to find André.

He was sitting at his study, which had been transformed.  It still bore a few marks of its earlier untidiness, but for the most part it had been restored to its customary order.  She blinked, looking around her, but André himself quickly caught her attention.

He looked… normal. Like himself.  More like himself than he had the day before.

The early morning sun cast a golden light over him, shining off his hair and the buttons on his clothes. His uniform was absent, but his clothes were crisp and white, and his hair was pulled back and tied neatly. His braid still bore the marks of her clumsy ministrations the night before, and the smudges under his eyes remained but aside from that…  She could almost believe that the night had not happened at all.  His eyes were bright as he looked up at her.  

“Good morning, Philomena,” he said, setting the quill he was holding into its inkjar.  “How are you?”

“Well enough,” she said, staring at him.  “But you can’t be feeling well, not after last night.”

His smile had a touch of sheepishness in it.  “In truth, you’re right.  But an unburdened mind is a useful thing; and I cannot afford to waste any more time.  Physical discomfort is little compared to… other pains.”  He gestured at the stool by his desk.  “Please, take a seat.”

She smiled, and sat down. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“Planning,” he said. “An opportunity such as Arnold is not one to be wasted.”


End file.
